General Assembly Session 58 meeting 36

The Acting President

Before proceeding to the items for this meeting, I should like to invite the attention of the General Assembly to document A/58/440. It contains a letter from the Secretary-General addressed to the President of the General Assembly, in which he informs the Assembly that 12 Member States are in arrears in the payment of their financial contributions to the United Nations under the terms of Article 19 of the Charter.

I should like to remind delegations that, under Article 19 of the Charter, a Member of the United Nations which is in arrears in the payment of its financial contributions to the Organization shall have no vote in the General Assembly if the amount of its arrears equals or exceeds the amount of the contributions due from it for the preceding two full years.

May I take it that the General Assembly duly takes note of the information contained in document A/58/440?

Mr. Kilo-Abi (Democratic Republic of the Congo)

With regard to the interaction between agenda item 11 and agenda item 56, my delegation felt that the two items could be taken up together.

Based on that understanding, the delegation of the Democratic Republic of the Congo is grateful to Ambassador John Negroponte, Permanent Representative of the United States of America and current President of the Security Council, for the quality of the presentation of his report, which has received my delegation's full attention. After having carefully studied the report of the Security Council submitted to us, which covers the period from 1 August 2002 to 31 July 2003, my delegation appreciates the sharp increase in the quality of the document, which describes the work tackled by this central organ of the United Nations that is responsible for the maintenance of international peace and security.

My delegation has noted that the concerns of the Security Council include, among others, the situation in the Middle East, the situation in certain European and Asian countries, the Kimberley Process, terrorism and the issue of peace in Africa, especially the situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, my country. In that connection, I wish to recall that, in commending the Security Council's efforts to restore peace to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, His Excellency the President of the Republic, Major-General Joseph Kabila, explicitly stated the following to the Assembly on 24 September 2003:

"The Congolese people continue to be grateful to the United Nations system for the assistance that it gave it through the United Nation Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Interim Emergency Multinational Force deployed in Bunia and especially for strengthening the peacekeeping mandate of the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo". (A/58/PV.10, p. 14)

To accommodate all of the challenges facing our country, where everything has to be rebuilt in this post-conflict period, the Democratic Republic of the Congo trusts that the international community will help in the transition now under way -- the ultimate purpose of which is to organize free, transparent and democratic elections -- by establishing a United Nations fund to address the immeasurable damage done to our country by several years of war and an international criminal tribunal for the Democratic Republic of the Congo to prosecute crimes of genocide and crimes against humanity, including rape used as a weapon of war and massive violations of human rights.

The Security Council has also focused on one issue of enormous concern to the entire human race. I refer to terrorism, an evil that gratuitously sows horror and devastation. In the face of this horrendous scourge, our countries must mobilize and put up a common front in order to terrorize the terrorism by stifling it in its innermost refuges. Accordingly, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, pursuant to resolution 1373 (2001), has established a national committee to coordinate the campaign against international terrorism and fully supports the work of the Counter-Terrorism Committee.

The maintenance of international peace and security, the development of friendly relations among States and the achievement of international cooperation are the founding principles of the United Nations. My delegation believes that the fulfilment of this noble mission requires, inter alia, the recognition of the sovereign equality of States, the peaceful settlement of disputes and the non-use or threat of use of force. However, international events have defied and continue to frustrate the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

As we all know, the world situation is currently prey to the accumulation of the most sophisticated nuclear and other weapons; the illicit traffic in small arms and light weapons; the noxious existence of anti-personnel landmines; the retreat of multilateralism on all fronts; the division of our planet into two parts, that of the poor and that of the rich and opulent; and the emergence of transnational crime and blind terrorism.

Faced with this truly alarming situation, my delegation believes that we must devise a plan to reform the system for the maintenance of international peace and security, focusing specifically on strengthening our capacity for collective action and the credibility of the Security Council. This will require, first, a revision of the Council's decision-making process and, secondly, an increase in its membership on the basis of equitable geographical representation, for instance by reserving one non-permanent seat for each of the regional continental groupings. It has been noted in this regard that regional and subregional organizations are increasingly being called on to help in the settlement of local conflicts. Thirdly, the Security Council must reconsider and further strengthen its relationship with the General Assembly. Fourthly, there must be greater cooperation with regional and subregional organizations in the area of preventive diplomacy.

My country supports the Secretary-General's proposal for the establishment of a panel of eminent personalities to make specific suggestions on Security Council reform. It is our ardent hope that such a worthy think tank can arrive at its conclusions as soon as possible. If it is to be dynamic and, above all, useful, the reform should not be directed against any particular State or group of member States. On the contrary, it must help to ensure an overall multilateral structure to which peoples and nations can come for sustenance and renewal.

Mr. Gallegos Chiriboga (Ecuador)

I wish to address the main elements in the debate on the issue before us, which I addressed previously when we considered the report of the Secretary-General on the work of the Organization.

Security Council reform has been of concern to Ecuador for a number of years and is an issue on which we have participated in extensive consultations. My delegation has noted that the Security Council should be adapted to meet contemporary challenges, which are exceedingly unlike those that led to its creation after the Second World War more than 50 years ago. The world in which we live is different from that of 1945. Today, problems are not only intergovernmental. We are facing new transnational perils, such as international terrorism, that require vigorous and effective international coordination. We are all in the same boat -- the problem belongs to everyone.

The Open-ended Working Group on Security Council reform established 10 years ago has made no significant progress. The initiative of creating that Working Group has allowed us to debate reform and, regrettably, to recognize that there has been no agreement among States, despite the fact that the large majority of leaders have affirmed the need for a more democratic and transparent Security Council. Moreover, the world is calling for a greater understanding of public issues at the global level and the United Nations cannot close its ears.

In this Hall, we have debated the desirability of allowing the Working Group to continue its work, in view of the results achieved to date. We need to ask ourselves why, in spite of the intelligent guidance and efforts of many delegations, fundamental agreement has not been achieved.

The reform of the Security Council cannot be achieved without the political resolve of all those present here. It is through a reform of the entire international system that we will be able to meet the demands of the international community. Reform of the Council has to involve the requisite reform of the United Nations Charter, and only in this way will we find an international structure in which the Organization will meet the needs and expectations of our peoples.

Increasing the number of the members of the Security Council is just a step in the right direction, but it is not in itself enough. We need to find new mechanisms that will make the Security Council more effective in fulfilling its obligation and mandates. At the same time, we need to ensure that the resolutions adopted by the Security Council are implemented by the entire international community.

Reform also has to tackle a new definition of the use of the power and exercise of the veto. Ecuador takes the view that we should not have a power of veto in an Organization based on pluralism and democracy, where all States are equal. When the Organization was created, this was a necessary concession, but it is no longer so. The use of the veto or the threat of its use has led to uses of power that are worrisome, in particular when we encounter what non-permanent members refer to as the "silent veto". Therefore we need to eliminate the use of the veto.

We, the majority of the countries of the world, are asking that reform be in accordance with the vision of world leaders and that it be carried out with the conviction that we must change the structures of an international architecture that no longer corresponds to the needs and expectations of human beings on this planet.

A few days ago, I expressed my belief that we must bring interests and realities closer together to achieve reform. It is vital that we should try to achieve the consensuses that will guarantee effectiveness in the international system's pursuit of peace. The initiative of the Secretary-General to set up a panel of eminent persons is extremely positive, but it could, after a year of work, end up in the same situation we are in today, immobilized owing to a lack of agreement among the Members of the General Assembly.

My country and my delegation pledge to cooperate with you, Sir, and to make a dedicated effort to try to devise the structural reform that we feel is essential and is the only way to establish a more democratic and equitable international community.